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"Shall we go up and join ested curtly, as Mr Jackson's last cone of ashes dropped into the brass ashtray at his elbow

On the drive hoh the darkness, he still felt her enveloped in her uess: but he was sufficiently warned by the fact that Madame Olenska's name had evoked it

They went upstairs, and he turned into the library She usually followed hie to her bedroom

"May!" he called out ilance of surprise at his tone

"This laht see that it's kept properly triruain," she answered, in the firht tone she had learned from her mother; and it exasperated Archer to feel that she was already beginning to huer Mr Welland She bent over to lower the wick, and as the light struck up on her white shoulders and the clear curves of her face he thought: "How young she is! For what endless years this life will have to go on!"

He felt, with a kind of horror, his own strong youth and the bounding blood in his veins "Look here," he said suddenly, "I ton for a few days--soon; next week perhaps"

Her hand remained on the key of the lamp as she turned to hilow to her face, but it paled as she looked up

"On business?" she asked, in a tone which implied that there could be no other conceivable reason, and that she had put the question automatically, as if merely to finish his own sentence

"On business, naturally There's a patent case coave the na details with all Lawrence Lefferts's practised glibness, while she listened attentively, saying at intervals: "Yes, I see"

"The change will do you good," she said sio and see Ellen," she added, looking hi in the tone she lect some irksome family duty

It was the only word that passed between them on the subject; but in the code in which they had both been trained it meant: "Of course you understand that I know all that people have been saying about Ellen, and heartily syet her to return to her husband I also know that, for some reason you have not chosen to tell ainst this course, which all the older ree in approving; and that it is owing to your encouragement that Ellen defies us all, and exposes herself to the kind of criticisave you, this evening, the hint that has ; but since you appear unwilling to take them from others, I offer you this one myself, in the only form in which well-bred people of our kind can co you understand that I know you ton, and are perhaps going there expressly for that purpose; and that, since you are sure to see her, I wish you to do so with my full and explicit approval--and to take the opportunity of letting her knohat the course of conduct you have encouraged her in is likely to lead to"